Jürgen Klopp believes an honest chat with Cody Gakpo has led to the Liverpool ace’s recent resurgence. Gakpo has started four of Liverpool’s last five matches, only missing the Merseyside derby as his wife gave birth to their first child.
The Dutch international was excellent against Tottenham last weekend, scoring one and making another in the 4-2 win. His bullet header from Harvey Elliott’s cross took his tally to 15 for the season.
Gakpo had struggled to nail down a regular starting spot for much of the campaign though, often being asked to play wide on the left. He faced criticism for some of his performances, including a below-par cameo in the FA Cup defeat to Manchester United.
But he has looked more like the player that Liverpool thought it had signed from PSV in recent matches and Klopp believes a chat with the 25-year-old was a key moment.
Speaking in his pre-match press conference ahead of Monday night’s trip to Aston Villa, Klopp said: “Cody, he knows that he was, for a while, not in his best moment. We had a conversation there, obviously not for public what we spoke about there, but it helped him a lot. We could sort it a little bit.
“It’s just the problem, can I speak in the first moment a player is not performing anymore to the levels you expect them to do? You can, but how can I have an answer for his situation if I don’t understand it? So we have to try to look a bit longer into it, wait for a specific moment when I can give answers.
“Maybe that is what took too long for me as well. But after that talk he really stepped up. It’s really good to see how physically strong he is, how good a footballer he is. He can play left wing especially and centre. Smart again, full of confidence, physical strength, good moment. Good for him, good for us.”
Gakpo’s improvement has coincided with a dip in form for Darwin Núñez, with the Dutchman leading the line at present There has been speculation that Núñez could leave this summer after he was unfairly the target of abuse, and subsequently deleted Liverpool-related content from his social media pages.
